Role models for Aryan supermen, cartoon ethics, trusting in Bush / Blair /Nixon, negating the drive toward individuality, the holocaust was perfectly valid… y’all remember this next time you hear someone say ?I don’t like [x], he’s a fascist.’

Morrison found flaws in his previous sense of what the purpose of his life and life in general was. He ditched the flawed understanding. Excellent.
He replaced it with a bigger ?purpose’ in which everyone is as groovy as everyone else. Bunk.

Here’s the scoop: he, me, everyone, and everything has no ?purpose.’ Some humans can give themselves a purpose that is satisfying. That’s about it.

‘Asked about the current state of the world, particularly the war in Iraq, Mr. Morrison offered, ?perhaps it’s just an essential part of the system, as horrible as that may seem.’ He wasn’t particularly interested in being part of any active anti-war movement, and noted that in his previous experience, a number of those people only seemed to be ?interested in meeting up with the police.”

I’d like to think that it goes with out saying that I don’t endorse Morrison’s philosophy on this, but since people very frequently confuse my opinions with the opinions of people I quote here, I figure I’ll set the record straight: I think Morrison’s whole ‘it’s all part of the system’s plan’ philosophy is a bunch of crap. I’m also not fond of his ‘individuality is an illusion’ stuff.

I don’t disagree with what I’ve read about Manuel DeLanda’s position on individuals and societies, but I haven’t read his new book yet. Shaviro’s review is here. He seems to reach a logical conclusion distinct from the over-romanticizing of of the individual and the problematic concepts of new age collectivism.

I look forward to reading Bloom’s Lucifer Principle as well.

‘Here’s the scoop: he, me, everyone, and everything has no ?purpose.’ Some humans can give themselves a purpose that is satisfying. That’s about it.’

Agreed, more or less. Nothing has any meaning save for what we impose on it. This is not bad/depressing, but liberating.

Bush and his cronies did not have to invade Iraq to fulfill some systemic destiny. They made a choice. We have a choice as well – accept the decisions made by the control machines, or struggle to change things.

“However, Nixon’s weary world ignored the eschatological opportunity I thought my brother’s inspired fiddling with hyperspace had afforded. The world continued grinding forward in its usual less than merry way. There was only one small incident that might subsequently be construed, even within the framework of the schizoid logic that was my bread and butter then, to support my position. Unknown to me, a struggling, overweight SF writer, an idol of mine since my teens, discovered the next day that his house have been broken into, his privacy violated by the Other. How peculiar that on the first day of the new dispensation in my private reformist calendar, he had been burglarized by extraterterrestials the CIA or his own deranged self in an altered state. The torch had been passed, in a weird way the most intense phase of my episode of illumination/delusion ended right where Phil’s began.”